Reaching out to hardware companies

[Ric Moore]

On Fri, 2010-10-22 at 21:23 -0500, Anthony Papillion wrote:
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> So I've been using Ubuntu on and off for a few years but recently
> decided to devote my entire laptop to it in my effort to oust Windows
> from my life as much as possible. So far, with a few exceptions,
> everything works great even on my older (4 year old) machine.
> 
> The exceptions to the 'greatness' are: audio, wireless networking, and
> some video (mostly Flash).
> 
> I know the old line about 'it's not Linux's fault, it's the hardware
> vendors' and I understand that. But I'm wondering what kind of concerted
> effort is being made to reach out to those vendors that do not support
> Linux?  I'm sure Canonical is actively working with many vendors but
> could the community do more?
> 
> I'm considering starting a group with the specific goal of doing
> hardware outreach. We'll interface with companies that don't support
> Linux, we'll lobby them, we'll work with them in whatever capacity they
> need us, and we'll even write the drivers if need be.
> 
> I'd like to get everyone's opinion on this approach. Is it something
> worthwhile to pursue? What do you think?

Red Hat did that quite successfully, as products were sent gratis to Red
Hat's location in the Research Triangle Park (RTP) next to Durham NC.
They would test the sample hardware and award the vendor "Red Hat Ready"
status, if it proved usable,  with a cute logo they could use. No idea
what happened to that. 

But, it worked well at a corporate level, but I doubt vendors would send
hardware samples to an individual or a small group of "concerned users".
So, some sort of official testing lab would have to be created and
become industry accredited. Otherwise the result would be "Well, Joe
says 'It Works!'" And Joe would be hit with unearned income from the
"gifts" reported to the IRS. <chuckles>  Ric


-- 
My father, Victor Moore (Vic) used to say:
"There are two Great Sins in the world...
..the Sin of Ignorance, and the Sin of Stupidity.
Only the former may be overcome." R.I.P. Dad.
Linux user# 44256